RYAN PYETTE, QMI Agency

SHAWINIGAN, Que. -- At this point, the London Knights and Shawinigan Cataractes have one more bit of preparation before Sunday night's Memorial Cup final.

Listen to their coach's stirring pre-game pep talk.

Or maybe not.

"At this point, I don't think we need the Miracle speech," London captain Jarred Tinordi said. "Mark (Knights GM and head coach Mark Hunter) isn't a big speech guy and we haven't had too many all year. We know what we're supposed to do and it's a matter of going out there and executing."

Quietly intense counterpart Eric Veilleux, whose host Cataractes are trying to become the second team in Cup history to win the final after playing in the tiebreaker game, has delivered his share of motivational talks over the last few weeks.

But not now.

"What is there to say," he said. "These are very intelligent kids. No big speech. We have our game plan and if they stick to it, they're going to be OK."

Heart-pumping word play isn't the Hunter forte. But working the refs before the big game is clearly still in style.

Hunter has watched endless tape of Shawinigan's games this week and has come to a conclusion.

The Cats are divers.

"They dive," he said. "They're pretty good at flopping. We don't want our guys diving, and hopefully, they don't. You don't want to see any of that affecting the outcome of the game.

"We came here and we didn't know too much about the other teams, but after watching them here, we feel like we know them pretty good."

Veilleux appeared to be taken aback by Hunter's suggestions.

"Diving," Veilleux responded. "What are we in -- the Olympics?"

Shawinigan, with the crowd on its side and hungry for a first Memorial Cup title, wants to turn the game into a world-class track meet. The Knights, champions on home ice in 2005, prefer to slow it down, block shots, force turnovers, convert odd-man rushes and make the fans restless and quiet.

"I actually like being the bad guy," said Tinordi, a Montreal Canadiens first-rounder. "It pumps you up when you go into a rink and everyone's booing you."

London lost 6-2 to Shawinigan in the round-robin portion of the tournament, but the Knights have learned from those mistakes.

"We'll be better," said forward Austin Watson, who will play in his second final after winning with Windsor in 2009. "This is what you work for all season."

The Knights will have defenceman Tommy Hughes, who was injured blocking a shot on Tuesday against Edmonton, back in the lineup. The Cataractes have been astute at getting pucks through to the net all week.

London has the Canadian Hockey League goalie of the year Michael Houser in its net. The Cataractes counter with tiny overager Gabriel Girard, who came into this week as the backup.

He's 3-1 and will be asked to beat Houser twice in the same tournament.